Intergranular cracking and failure of carbon steel and/or piping and vessels occurs in certain refinery streams, especially refinery streams containing water. The metal vessels and piping in contact with these streams are subject to blistering and stress corrosion cracking due to certain chemical contaminants in the streams such as hydrogen sulfide, ammonia, carbon dioxide, hydrogen cyanide, and the like. The presence of these chemicals contributes to corrosion cracking and blistering of iron and steel vessels in contact with these refinery streams, particularly when these refinery streams contain water, hydrogen cyanide and hydrogen sulfide.
It would, therefore, be an advancement in the art if one could derive a composition which would react both with hydrogen sulfide and particularly with any source of cyanide, be it hydrogen cyanide or salts of cyanide. Even phenomena such as hydrogen blistering and hydrogen induced cracking appear to be dependent on the presence of cyanide. Therefore, the removal of cyanide from refinery streams in contact with these steel refinery vessels and piping should be beneficial in minimizing hydrogen blistering or hydrogen induced cracking.